Breastfeeding and Entertaining a Toddler on a Plane

Greetings from Germany! Landon and I flew from Newark, NY, to Hamburg, Germany, a few days ago to visit Nani and Opa.

My mother picked us up and we arrived in my former hometown Bremen about 1 1/2 hours later. Landon had been a doll on the plane. It was the first time that we had to pay for his seat as well, and I had been wondering how he would do. I rented one of those kids airplane harnesses in the hope that it would make L feel like he was sitting in his cars seat, but that didn’t work out too well.

But aside from wanting to see the bathroom every hour again, he did pretty well in his seat. I felt bad for the young man next to us, though, who was trying to sleep the whole eight hours. Landon kept nudging or kicking him inadvertently, but he was a good sport about it.

It was a bit of a challenge to keep L from kicking the seat in front of me when he was sitting on my lab, or from hitting the buttons on the screen in front of us, which he did a little too enthusiastically for the taste of the lady in front of us.

But playing with the headphones and the headphone plugs kept L occupied for about half an hour, and I had also collected little toys over the last few weeks that I thought might interest him. I bought several wind-up toys that were slow and didn’t run off the little table, and a few finger puppets.

I also packet a little sticker book and a few sheets of those free address stickers we get with junk mail. Landon liked deciding which of the stickers he wanted me to peel of the page and then proceeded to put them on the sticker book and the TV screen. That killed another 15 minutes.

One more thing: I put L’s little froggie and all the new toys in a new little backpack I gave him right before we left for the airport. He was so proud of it that he had it sitting next to him the whole car ride and wore it the whole time in the airport. It made him feel very special to have his own bag, and closing and opening the bag was another time-consuming task that let me have a few quiet moments.

At 11 p.m. I made it clear that I wanted him to sleep. He fought me for quite a while, but he finally fell asleep in my arms while nursing.

Nursing a toddler in public is a whole different animal than nursing a baby, and I’m not even referring to the looks you sometimes get when nursing a toddler who can ask for “ba ba.” L has taken to wanting to play with the other breast when he nurses and keeps pushing my shirt up, which makes the breastfeeding session a bit of a wrestling match.

I never covered him when breastfeeding him as a baby, because even though I had a beautiful cover it was so hard to try to latch him on with that cover in the way and I couldn’t see easily how he was doing. So I abandoned that after a few tries and just pull up my shirt, making sure I don’t show any skin. I also never bothered buying expensive breastfeeding clothes, I didn’t feel the need. But now L resists me covering him so I don’t show my breasts to the whole world when he pulls up my shirt, hence the wrestling match.

I didn’t get more than a few minutes of sleep, but I got to see part of a movie with L snoozing in my lab and also ate breakfast with one hand before he woke up. When it was time to buckle up again for the landing, L didn’t want to get into the confining harness again and got cranky, probably because the pressure in his ears was starting to bother him. Ignoring the seat belt sign, I let him nurse until we saw the ground and by then he was so interested in seeing the green fields and houses from above that I got him strapped in again in time for the touchdown.

My recommendations for flying with and nursing a toddler:

Fly with your partner or someone else who can help you, if possible!

If you are traveling alone with a young child that has his or her own seat, get one of those harnesses so you can check your car seat (you can buy or rent them from Traveling With Kids).

Buy and collect little toys that are new to your child and will work on the little airplane table.

Pack all kinds of snacks and breastfeed, if possible, to keep your child hydrated and a content little traveler. In my experience people are too happy to have a calm child next to them to give you a disapproving look.

Just to be on the safe side, get your partner to sign a “permission to travel” consent form and get in notarized if you are traveling internationally. I have never had to show it so far, but I rather have it with me. I found a consent form on the Internet and Don gets it notarized at our bank for free.

Be prepared for your almost potty-trained toddler to proudly announce, “Big pee pee coming!” to everyone in earshot before you can rush him to the restroom, but other than that, airplane travel with a small child is less stressful and definitely doable with a little planning.

For more information about the rental airplane harness, the Maya wrap I used to use when traveling with L, and the Sit ‘N’ Stroll 5-in-1 stroller/carseat I CAN’T live without, go here.

Get more practical, helpful tips from green mommy bloggers at Healthychild.org!

Comments

I flew transatlantic alone with Sam when he was one, and did all those things, too. My trip didn’t go as smoothly though. Not because of Sam…

Everything you can imagine going wrong with the airport, you name it, happened! Forgot handluggage at first X-ray check, noticed just before boarding, told stewardess, who told me I would lose my flights (which were non- rescheduable, and non-refundable, so I had a little breakdown). They agreed to walk me back to X-ray check, where I reccuperated my baggage. We boarded. They declined to give me my stroller’s chassis at the gate, although they had promissed to.

Made it barely to the connection flight, then when we arrived, had to walk from gate to luggage collection belt with Sam in one arm, plus bag of toys, purse, cabin luggage, and infant car seat, which they allowed me to board with, promissing to wait for me at the door with chassis (which they didn’t)… In the end, they called someone from the handicap department, who helped me carry our stuff…

When we finally got our suitcases and chassis from the belt, noticed they had taken out the stuff I had in the underseat basket. Had to ask half a million people from airport staff and security, for permission to get it back, and finally we did.

What really helped me was to have an almost empty sport bottle with me, ’cause I got very thirsty and asked the stewardess to fill it up, rather than getting up for a tiny glass of water every half hour.

We also nursed on the flight, I let Sam crawl and walk around, although I was grossed by him being on the carpet of the plane… but found no other way out, he just needed to move!

I vaccum packed home-made food too, in small bottles, which I served him in a separate bowl, with a clean spoon each time, in order for the rest not to spoil. He ate little, but I think it made him more comfortable to have some home-made food away from home :)

Another thing that really helped was taking our baby wrap, didn’t want to leave Sam with a stranger, or let him stand on the toilet floor and risk him touching stuff, ick! So I tied him to my back every time I needed to go.

Good luck with this summer’s trip, I’m sure it’ll be even smoother ;) Looking forward to reading about it!

So glad it went well! I flew to Germany with my daughter when she was almost three months old, then back when she was six months old. I certainly didn’t get to watch the movie, but it was pretty good overall :)

I’m so glad to hear everything went well. I myself have traveled many times with THREE children (all of them six and under at these times) alone. The biggest part in keeping them calm and quiet was me making sure I had a schedule planned out for the plane ride. From coloring for 20 mins. to playing with one toy for 15 mins. to snacking for 15 mins. and so on. Jetblue was nice because they list their t.v. schedule online so I was able to plan out what shows they might like and that seemed to be a little treat for them. Although I didn’t breastfeed on the plane ride it’s always important to make sure little ones have something to drink as the plane is decending that way they can sit safely in their seat and be able to release the pressure off of their ears. I must say I have never had to chase my kids up and down the aisles (like I’ve seen) and I’ve always had a compliment after each ride so I have been fortunate to have well traveled kids. I think the screaming children portrayed in movies can be avoided as long as we, the parents, prepare and plan out for the entire flight. Have a wonderful trip back!

Isn’t it fun flying with toddlers!!? We just flew back from France yesterday with our 3yr old and 1 1/2 yr old … man what a flight!! We had our car seats on board with us, but Matthew also kept kicking the seat and hitting the TV screen buttons with alot of gusto. It was a long flight but we made it there and back without too many nasty looks from other passengers. I swear, I think parents deserve medals for flying long distance with toddlers … I’ll never be annoyed at any child on a flight ever again! Enjoy Germany :o)

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